‘Mario Kart’ venue to open in June
Niagara Speedway attraction almost done on Clifton Hill
The go-kart attraction on Clifton Hill, which some observers have compared to real-life Mario Kart, is scheduled to open by June.
“Our kind of official opening is like June 1st. We’re hoping we get opened a little sooner, but that will be if everything falls in place and our inspections go well,” said Harry Oakes, president of HOCO Limited, which owns and operates attractions, restaurants and shops on the south side of the street.
He said construction on the threeacre site took about a year-and-a-half.
Oakes said the go-kart attraction, which will be the first such largescale elevated track of its kind in Canada, has been referred to by bloggers as being similar to Mario Kart, a popular series of go-kart-style racing video games developed and published by Nintendo.
“Obviously we don’t. Nintendo wouldn’t want us to call it Mario Kart, but it’s just somebody picked that up online,” he said.
“The rendering kind of makes it look a little bit like Mario Kart, so I think that’s where that came from.”
Oakes said the Niagara Speedway project is getting a lot of traffic on social media.
“It’s unique to Canada, it’s the first one in Canada and I think it’s that combination of go karts, which traditionally are very popular and you put it on a track that looks like a roller-coaster, it’s kind of a unique attraction that way.”
The go-kart attraction was the final part of a larger, four-hectare project that included renovations to existing restaurants, new attractions, concessions and parking.
“Ripley’s museum was totally gutted and redone. Kelsey’s was totally renovated. We added a zombie attraction. We added some additional concessions. We added another arcade and we developed a 700-car parking lot.”
Oakes said the project was in addition to other improvements made on Clifton Hill.
“This is probably the last significant component of our redevelopment over the last 10 years,” he said.
“What it does is locks together everything. It’s not only the new area we’ve done, but it kind of pulls all the other new operations we’ve added over the last 10 years and creates critical mass out of the entertainment centre that way.”